Mary O'Rourke (Fianna Fail)

I am very pleased to speak about this Bill and I join other Senators in wishing the Minister well with his new remit. He will make a great go of it coming from an Army town himself, the city of Limerick. I speak as someone from Athlone, the headquarters of the Western Command, which has an extensive complement of personnel at all ranks from the enlisted to the top. I was born and brought up 100 yards from Custume Barracks whose Army community has been very involved in the town of Athlone. The members of the Defence Forces, their wives, children and extended families form an integral part of the work and social lives of the town.

The Bill is overdue and I am very happy with it. I pay tribute to Deputy Michael Smith, the previous Minister, who put great care into the legislation. His five-year guardianship of the Defence Forces was a model as he worked through cutbacks and obtained money from all sorts of places. He had an amicable relationship with PDFORRA and all ranks of the Army. The Minister's speech made interesting reading. My late brother, Brian Lenihan, as Minister for Defence in the late 1980s, began the consultation process. An alarming incident involving Army wives which occurred in the lead up to 1989 election caused a great deal of friction at the time. It was following that incident that former Taoiseach, Charles Haughey, appointed my late brother, Brian Lenihan, Minister for Defence. He worked with former Senator Brian Hillery who had a doctorate from UCD and was very strong on personnel matters. PDFORRA was established at that time providing the Army with a union-type organisation to represent it.

Following the establishment of PDFORRA, the CIO was established to deal with specific complaints. I was aware all my life that it did no good for a private or corporal in the Army to use the redress system. I handled many cases of redress none of which was of value to the enlisted person. Such complaints got nowhere because armies have hierarchies and when the hierarchy moved in, the enlisted soldier obtained no redress much as he or she tried. I have been involved in many such cases down through the years and I am not aware of one complaint that was upheld. However, things are different now.

I have no objection to captains, lieutenants, commanders and so on; that is the structure of armies. However, it was impossible to properly investigate complaints because the hierarchy always won out. Those who brought such complaints were usually enlisted soldiers and matters were loaded in favour of those in command. The CIO helped in particular cases and worked effectively within its remit. Dr. Eileen Doyle, whom I know very well, was, during my term as Minister for Education and Science, very high up in educational managerial status. She was a nun who, on leaving her order, set herself up as a consultant. The Doyle report produced by her was an important milestone for the Army. It set out what could and could not be done and much flowed from it. Dr. Doyle who undertook further reports for the Army is a brilliant, clever and strategically able woman. A commitment was given to the establishment of an ombudsman for defence following the publication of her report.

My final letter to former Minister, Deputy Michael Smith, set out my intention to deal with this legislation during the first week of the Seanad's return. However, that was not possible given the reshuffle and it is being taken today. The Minister travels to Letterkenny tomorrow to meet PDFORRA.

Many important amendments were made to the Bill on Committee Stage in the Dáil including the retention of personal appeal to the Minister in specific cases not covered by the ombudsman's remit. That is good. The scope of the ombudsman's remit is laid out and rightly so. I notice with alarm the use of the word "he" in the context of all references to the ombudsman. I presume the ombudsman does not have to be male.